Rodgers targets seven in a row
How do you improve on perfection? Well, Brendan Rodgers and his Celtic players will discover if that is possible between now and May.
Celtic put themselves in the record books with their remarkable 2016-17 campaign, which not only delivered three pieces of silverware but also produced an unbeaten domestic season. The Premiership, Scottish Cup and League Cup were delivered in his first season as Rodgers became only the third manager in the club’s history to win a treble, after Jock Stein and Martin O’Neill.
Rodgers’ side earned a record 106 points with 34 wins and four draws and the former Liverpool manager is now setting his sights on a seventh successive Scottish Premiership title for Celtic.
However, it says a lot about the Northern Irishman’s desire for perfection that he has spoken almost as much about the points his team dropped last term as the games they won.
Rodgers is known for his attention to detail, so it was no surprise that he used the pre-season trip to Austria to outline his plans for Celtic’s 49th league title.
“When you’ve had such a great season it’s important that you reflect on that, but we couldn’t because everyone split up on international duty right after we beat Aberdeen in the Scottish Cup final,” said Rodgers. “So, we gave the players a workshop in Austria and they talked about how special it is to be here and what were the key elements to our success last year.
“But this is a new chapter this season. We have to put last year away with the club’s other great memories, and defend our trophies and be the best we can be.”
Rodgers has recruited young French midfielder Olivier Ntcham – who spent two years on loan at Genoa – from Manchester City for £4.5m and Irish winger Jonny Hayes, who was outstanding at Aberdeen, for £1.2m.
The pair will augment the creativity for a side in which Moussa Dembele was
outstanding after joining from Fulham.
Aberdeen will pose the greatest threat to Celtic and although Derek McInnes’ side finished 30 points behind Celtic last term, the north-east side managed their best-ever total. Their performance in the Scottish Cup Final, when extra-time beckoned until Tom Rogic’s 92nd-minute winner for Celtic, offers signs of hope.
The fact that McInnes’ relative success at Pittodrie came on half the budget of Rangers underlines why Ibrox still has a fault-line running through it. Rangers finished 39 points behind Celtic and parted company with manager Mark Warburton in February.
His replacement, Pedro Caixinha, was off the radar coaching in the Middle East, but the Portuguese was given a rude awakening when Celtic won 5-1 at Ibrox last April in his first Glasgow derby.
Caixinha has signed nine new players, mostly from Portugal and South America (he worked in Mexico), but the pressure is already on after his side were beaten 2-1 on aggregate in the first qualifying round of the Europa League by Progres Niedekorn of Luxembourg.
The Premiership is undoubtedly enhanced by the return of Hibernian and the Edinburgh club will play to sold out crowds at Easter Road under Neil Lennon. Across the city, Hearts sacked their manager, Ian Cathro, before the league had even got underway. The 31-year-old paid the price for a penalty shoot-out defeat by Dunfermline that meant his team failed to progress from the group stage of the League Cup.